Civic Education and Charter Schools: Current Knowledge and Future Research Issues
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Civic Education and Charter Schools: Current Knowledge and Future Research Issues Summary of Findings Preparing young people to be good citizens has been a mission of public education since the early days of the nation. In recent years, as schools have shifted more attention to English language arts and mathematics, several groups have made a plea for renewed attention to civic education for all students. One such group is the Spencer Foundation, which promotes research to improve students’ civics knowledge and skills and their dispositions for responsible citizenship. Of particular interest to the Spencer Foundation and others are three questions relating to the status of civic education in the rapidly growing sector of charter schools—publicly funded schools that are typically governed by an organization under a contract or charter with a state or other jurisdiction: • How does the civics achievement of charter school students compare with that of students in traditional public schools? • Do charter schools typically offer different types of civics instruction than traditional schools? • How can the current body of research about civic education and charter schools be strengthened? Center on Education Policy Graduate School of Education and Human Development The George Washington University 2 At the request of the Spencer Foundation, the Center on Education Policy (CEP) at The George Washington University addressed these questions by analyzing data from the 2010 civics assessment of the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). This is the most recent NAEP civics assessment and the only one that breaks out data for charter schools and traditional public schools. We also reviewed the broader research literature on charter schools and civic education and engagement. Our main findings are summarized below. Statistically Significant Findings from NAEP NAEP is the only nationally representative dataset on civics achievement and instruction in charter schools, but it has serious limitations as regards charter schools. Results from the civics assessment are available only for the nation as a whole and are not broken out by urban, suburban, or rural location. Thus, while comparisons can be made between a representative sample of all charter schools and all traditional public schools in the nation, it is not possible to compare urban charter schools with urban traditional schools, even though most charters are concentrated in urban areas and serve the diverse populations found in urban school districts. In addition, the sample of charter school students who took the 2010 assessment was small, and the standard error rates for charter school results are high, as explained in the NAEP section of this report. Consequently, differences between charter and traditional schools that appear to be large are often not statistically significant. We addressed this last limitation by grouping the results of the NAEP analysis into two categories: “statically significant” findings that meet NAEP’s criteria for significance, and “suggestive” differences between charter and traditional public schools that are not statistically significant but are large enough to suggest a need for further research using other methods. Center on Education Policy Graduate School of Education and Human Development The George Washington University 3 Our analysis of the NAEP 2010 civics data revealed a number of statistically significant differences between charter and traditional public schools, as well as several noteworthy similarities: • Overall, civics achievement was similar for students in charter and traditional schools. At most grades, and for most racial/ethnic student groups, the civics achievement of charter school students did not differ significantly from that of traditional public school students in 2010. • Significant differences between charter and traditional public schools were evident for a few student groups at particular grades. Hispanic 8th graders in charter schools scored significantly higher in civics than those in traditional schools. Male 12th graders in traditional public schools scored significantly higher than those in charter schools. • There were no significant differences between charter and traditional public schools in how often students reported studying social studies. At grade 8, a large majority of both groups reported having social studies lessons every day. • Fourth-grade teachers in both charter and traditional public schools appeared to place about the same amount of emphasis on basic civics topics. For example, similar percentages of 4th grade teachers in both school sectors reported giving “moderate” emphasis in their social studies classes to politics and government, foundations of U.S. democracy, the role of citizens in U.S. democracy, and other topics. • Some differences were evident in the civics topics studied by students in charter and traditional public schools. At grade 8, for example, significantly higher percentages of charter school students than of traditional school students reported studying the U.S. Congress, how laws are made, the court system, and the U.S. Constitution. At grade 12, the percentages of students who did not study international organizations and other countries’ governments were higher in Center on Education Policy Graduate School of Education and Human Development The George Washington University 4 traditional schools than in charter schools. Roughly equal percentages of 12th graders in charter and traditional public schools reported taking an Advanced Placement government and politics course. • Some significant differences emerged in how social studies was taught in charter and traditional public schools. At grade 8, significantly higher percentages of charter school students than of traditional school students reported taking part in role play, mock trials, and dramas one to two times per month. A greater share of charter school 8th graders also reported responding to short-answer questions in their social studies classes almost every day. At grade 12, charter school students wrote long answers to questions more often than their peers in traditional schools. • Similar proportions of 4th grade teachers in charter and traditional public schools reported basing their social studies programs on state curriculum standards. Roughly equal percentages of 4th grade teachers in both school sectors also reported that their school’s social studies programs were structured around district and national assessment results. However, significantly higher percentages of traditional school teachers said their social studies programs were based to a large extent on district curriculum standards, district recommendations, and national curriculum standards. • In general, students in charter and traditional public schools had similar responses about the availability of resources at home that could contribute to civics knowledge. Roughly equal percentages of charter and traditional public school students reported having computers and newspapers at home, and the two groups were similar in how often they discussed what they had studied in school with someone at home. Center on Education Policy Graduate School of Education and Human Development The George Washington University 5 Suggestive Results from NAEP Although not statistically significant, the following differences in NAEP results between charter and traditional public schools were large enough to warrant further investigation, perhaps using other data sources or research methods: • Some suggestive differences were found in civics achievement. At grade 12, the average civics scores were higher for traditional public school students than for charter school students, though not significantly so. This was the case both for students overall and for some student subgroups. At grade 8, while the average scores for students overall were not widely different in the two sectors, there was a consistent pattern of apparently higher scores for charter school students in certain subgroups, such as African American and low-income students. • NAEP data suggest some possible differences between charter and traditional public schools in the sources of their 4th grade social studies curricula. A noticeably higher percentage of charter school teachers reported structuring their social studies program “to a large extent” around school-based standards, although the differences were not statistically significant. In addition, higher shares of traditional public school teachers reported structuring their social studies programs to some extent on teacher discretion—a counterintuitive result that warrants further exploration. Findings from Our Review of Other Research In addition to analyzing NAEP data, we reviewed other research literature on civic education and charter schools, as well as more general studies of civic education in all public and private schools. This review produced one major finding: • Very little empirical research exists on civic education in charter schools—or, for that matter, in public schools in general. Only a small number of published Center on Education Policy Graduate School of Education and Human Development The George Washington University 6 dissertations and papers have specifically examined civic education in charter schools. A limited number of studies have looked at best practices for teaching civics and promoting civic education in public schools, but these studies usually focused on particular districts, schools, or programs. In general,